Research for Undergraduates in Theoretical Ecology (RUTE) is
an NSF-funded program of the Department of Mathematics, the School of Biological Sciences, and the Fisheries and Wildlife Program
of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. The
principal components of this program are the RUTE Scholars program and the RUTE
Summer Scholars program. The RUTE
Scholars program involves year-long research projects conducted by teams of
four undergraduates, two in life science and two in mathematics, along with a faculty
mentors from life sciences and mathematics. Teams engage in a structured research program
consisting of focused preparation, laboratory and/or field work, and
mathematical analysis and modeling. The
first team studied the ecology of a painted turtle population in western Nebraska. Its work has been presented at a fisheries and
wildlife conference and a paper is in preparation. The RUTE Summer Scholars program is an
intensive five-week introduction to the process and methods of
interdisciplinary research in theoretical ecology. Students take a 3-credit course called
Research Skills in Theoretical Ecology; this course is team-taught by a
biologist and a mathematician, and centers on the theme of natural control of
insect pests. The students do laboratory
studies of aphid life history and population dynamics, lady beetle life
history, and predation of aphids by lady beetle larvae. The lecture material is driven by the need to
analyze the laboratory data and the goal of developing mathematical models for
the population dynamics of aphids with and without lady beetles.